I just don’t understand it, I gave it lots of thoughtThe pollsters were predicting everything that I had sought.Trump’s defeat was probable, Five Thirty-Eight declaredAnd so for this result I was completely unprepared.

He was boorish and abrasive, he was coarse and he was crudeTo folks with disabilities he couldn’t be more rude.Mexicans and Muslims? He would like to get them out.As for women he kept sounding like a predatory lout.

How could someone so offensive be elected just the sameA man who is apparently without a sense of shame?The answers they are many and in time there will be more But here are some it’s obvious we simply can’t ignore.

All those jobs that we’ve been losing in a globalizing trendAnd the shift to automation that will surely never end.If you’re lacking a degree and living in a blighted townThe future that you’re facing points irrevocably down.

Clinton’s e-mail issue gave her not a moment’s peace.Expensive Wall Street speeches which she never would release.Then Comey’s intervention which all commonsense defiesA wholly inappropriate election week surprise

Could race have been a factor that impelled some to decide?
By Trump and his supporters it’s indignantly denied.Yet the KKK and David Duke were fervent in their praiseAnd Bannon and the alt-rights were not a passing phase.

Even so we shouldn’t panic, let us not bemoan our fateI don’t believe we’re heading for a semi-fascist state.Our system isn’t broken, though sometimes it may bend.Democracy. I’m quite convinced, is not about to end.

I hope that reassures you, gives you reasons not to quit.Yet when it comes to Donald Trump I fear I must admit As you look at my predictions you’re unlikely to ignoreThat time and time again I’ve been completely wrong before.

Posted on Saturday, November 19, 2016 (Archive on Friday, August 16, 2019)